Hero for Once
by grace121
Summary: In which the great Captain Usopp gets to be the hero of his stories for once. Warning: Mature content, Zoro angst, and a little bit of fluff. No pairings. Warning 2: This is my first ever attempt to write any kind of story! Be kind!


The log pose needed only about nine hours to be set. Straw-hat crew had just arrived at a small summer island that was said to have the best takoyaki in the world. Luffy of course didn't need any other excuse to shoot himself through to the small village, promising an angry Nami that he would be back immediately after lunch. Sanji was rather excited to walk around and try the famous cuisines of the island too. This part of the ocean seemed to be treating different species of octopus pretty well, and as a chef Sanji know that he could find many interesting local recipes here. He took Franky and Brook with him too, so that they could restock on food ingredients for the next few weeks. Chopper joined them as well, to get more minerals he needed for his medicines. Since they would be leaving soon, the girls decided to take a look at the clothing stores. That left Usopp and Zoro alone on the ship.

Zoro was pretty annoyed to say the least. Okay, so he had a terrible sense of direction (not that he ever admitted that aloud) but even if he got lost, he could find his way back after a couple of hours right?

Nami didn't give him that much credit though, and since the crew wanted to leave at 5pm sharp, with a couple of angry threats she had managed to get her way. On the other hand, a few hours in the daylight wasn't Zoro's favorite time to stroll around the city either. He didn't need to buy anything right now, the bars weren't all that fun until hours later, and he was behind on his nap schedule anyway. Not to mention someone had to take care of the Sunny.

Even though he had already volunteered to guard the ship, Usopp couldn't be trusted with the Sunny right now. He had been awed by all the different octopi in the sea and was trying to get a couple of each of them and throw them into the ship's aquarium. Before reaching the island, the crew had managed to capture the greatest octopus Zoro had ever seen in his life, and Usopp was too excited to get more different octopi and throw them into the Sunny's aquarium.

"Uhahaha!! That's Captain Usopp for you! Thought you could trick me? Gotcha!"

Zoro listened to Usopp's excited monotone for a while. The sun was pleasantly warm today and the soft breeze was particularly appealing. Sprawled lazily at the shadows of Nami's orange trees, the swordsman was slowly lulled to a nice little nap...

"Oi! Oi Zoro-kun..."

Usopp's hesitant voice woke Zoro and he opened a single eye at the sniper.

"What is it?" He asked, voice gruff with sleep.

"You know, I wouldn't wake you up if I didn't think it was a very serious matter! You see, uhm, my impact dial suddenly fell into the aquarium... Not that I need the dial cuz I'm too awesome already, but, thisstupidbigblackbeastisgonnaeatiiiit!!!"

Usopp had obviously let his bag tip over and had lost its belonging in the aquarium. And Zoro knew he was probably too scared of the octopi to dive in and get his stuff back himself.

"Hnnn..."

He sighed, but decided he had had a good enough nap already and could use a break. Sitting up and slumping on himself lazily, he took his shirt and boots off, throwing them carelessly beside his swards and got up. On a second thought he took his haramaki and pants off as well. No need to get them wet. He decided to keep his underwear on though. Not that Usopp was the kind to care about these stuff. He and Luffy were pretty liberal at the bathroom after all. But Zoro wasn't quite comfortable revealing his light green shades to a kid like that.

As he got closer to the aquarium's trap door he became actually impressed by the number of different octopi that were swimming in the storage.

"Hey Usopp that's an impressive number you've got down here."

He commented in his deep voice when he was standing over the entrance.

"Of course!! I've got more than a thousand species down there!"

"Looks more like a few dozen to me, but that's still better than what you've ever done."

"Yeah they like Sunny's shade so much it's overflowing with octopus down there. That, and of course you're talking to the best fisher in the history ever-"

"Where did you throw the dial?"

"Aww I didn't through it on purpose! I think it was down there before..." He pointed to a spot directly below the trap door "...but that black octopus there..." He pointed to the large black octopus that the crew had hunted back in the morning, which was currently rubbing his tentacles over the aquarium window "... took it and moved it somewhere else I can't see anymore...".

Figures.

So that's what had scared the poor bloke, Zoro thought to himself. He squinted into the water trying to get a better look. He knew how important the dial was to the kid, so he decided to help him out this time. The swordsman sat down and lowered his legs into the pleasantly cool water and faced the sharpshooter.

"Okay I'm getting it for you, but go to the gallery and show me where it is through the window. It's so crowded down here it'll take me forever to find it."

"Aw thanks Zoro-kun! Sure, see you down there! Try not to get lost hahahaha",

And Zoro (shouting an annoyed "shut up") watched as Usopp disappeared into the door leading to the gallery downstairs.

He gave it a few seconds until he could spot Usopp down at the window, and taking a deep breath, descended fully into the water.

It was really crowded down here. Small octopi and large octopus tentacles were everywhere, squirming and robbing against each other, the floor, the window, and to his disgust his own body.

He looked over and saw Usopp pointing to the furthest corner of the aquarium, behind a large mass of swimming little octopi, to where the dial was. The large black octopus was trying to grasp it, but the dial was at the exact corner of the aquarium and the tentacles couldn't circle around the object properly.

Zoro swam over and pushed away fish after fish, and arm after arm, until he finally tilted downward and grabbed the dial, and again had to push back the slimy chubby tentacles and swim past the beasts.

He rolled his eyes at the thumbs-up gestures from Usopp, ignoring the warm feeling of affection that Usopp's genius grin was invoking in his heart, and kicked forward to get to the trap door above. Usopp has become like a dear brother to him in the past months, and as much as Zoro tried not to show it, he would do anything to help him stay happy. Even if it meant getting his dial for him.

A small yellowish octopus decided at that moment that Zoro's left ear and his earrings were fun to attach himself to.

Zoro rolled his eyes a second time, and with his free hand detached the floating little animal from his face. Deep down he could hear Sanji's voice teasing him about his green hair under the water. He snorted and a few bubbles came flouting out of his nose. Just like Usopp, his and Sanji's relationship had somehow, at some point, turned from rivalry into a deep friendship. Not that either of them outwardly admitted it though, but the looks that they exchanged before and after battles, making sure the other was all right was actually and surprisingly a welcome change.

The little fish he was holding in his hand squeezed its body to get away, and sent a small amount of purplish ink right into Zoro's face. He narrowed his eyes to try to avoid having the god knows what liquid in his eyes and swam on to get out, but just then three more small octopi stuck to him. One to his right knee, one to his left ankle and a third one, to his annoyance, to the waistline of his underwear, trying to get in!

He cursed and kept swimming till he was close enough to the open trap door and throw the dial up and out. With his now free hands he took the little animals off himself one by one while gesturing to Usopp that his dial was up on the deck now.

Out of the corner of his eyes he saw that Usopp was moving his hands frantically. Zoro frowned and tried to understand if Usopp is asking him to pick some more stuff, but couldn't hear or understand a word. He was running out of air anyway, so he ignored it and kicked over to the exit.

Or that was his plan at least.

As soon as he moved his leg one large, fast and black _thing_ tightened around his waist and pulled strongly. Caught by surprise, Zoro turned his head and to his horror the thing around his waist turned out to be a heavy and slimy tentacle attached to the big black octopus they had caught earlier together.

Zoro's eyes went wide. He kicked harder and turned back and forth to free himself, but unfortunately this had the exact opposite effect. Not only the tentacle squeezed tighter around his waist and dragged him more strongly, but two more large tentacles approached him too.

Not a good sign. Not at all, and even less so when he was running out of air!

He threw his arms forward harder and kicked his legs as fast as he could but all he got out of this was two more tentacles circling around his neck and knees.

_"Shit!"_

He had exactly half a second to let the situation sink in before both beast's arms tightened around his limbs, pinning his legs tightly together and pressing more firmly around his throat, causing him to lose that little air he still had in his mouth.

He couldn't kick forward anymore with his legs trapped like this, so he tried to claw at the black limbs instead, but with a heart that was being filled with cold dread every passing second he felt himself being pulled further and further back down and closer to the animal's head.

Now completely under the head (and sucking mouth!) of the octopus, he was left at the mercy of the other tentacles. Heavy limbs rubbed against his body one after the other, one managing to get a hold of his left arm, gripping impossibly hard with all those suction cups, and pulling it away from his body above his head backward, to a point that Zoro felt it might be dislocated at any minute. Zoro's struggles were completely ineffective and another tentacle joined the one around his knees and the two managed to each encircle one of his legs.

For a moment Zoro felt a sparkle of hope. If he could kick with each leg separately he could get away, but his captive must have sensed his renewed freedom too, because it suddenly pulled each leg down and apart, successfully fixing his whole body at shoulder, neck, waist and both knees.

Zoro wondered how a passive day could have possibly turned out like this. In less than a minute he had been completely out-powered by a brainless piece of meat. Just then he decided that if he got out of this mess alive, he would sallow his damn pride and ask the crap cook to teach him how to be more flexible under water.

That was when his right arm and hand were also pinned backward by another tentacle.

_"Damn!" _he thought to himself, completely and ridiculously helpless now. Zoro tried to clear his mind to find a solution. Any solution. He turned his eyes, hoping to see Usopp, but the gallery was empty now. He only hopped that the kid could find a way to release him. But honestly, having to rely on Usopp to save him from a food ingredient, could this get any more humiliating?!

As it turned out, due to the special status of his luck, it actually could! With left arm painfully stretched above his head, the other one pulled behind him, his waist being pulled forward, while his head slowly being pulled backwards, with his lungs screaming for air, and his legs being stretched downwards and outwards, away from each other, Zoro was left to watched perplexed as the tip of tentacle around his neck started strolling over his face.

_"No fucking way!"_ He closed his eyes and lips tightly, as the floating limb passed over them, and shuddered when it started moving into his left ear. He felt rather than saw when suddenly all those arms around him contracted for a moment, like the animal had just had a huge pleasure from pushing into his ear. As if on cue, all tentacle tips started stroking his whole body.

_"Oh god, not this!"_

Zoro began to panic as the tentacles around his legs moved further and further up, until they both grabbed around his boxers' sides. He squirmed and wiggled and shook his body with a renewed determination to stop the arms from causing him more humiliation, but again he was easily outpowered, and his body was mercilessly hauled around, up and down, left and right. He was starting to get nauseous, and his limbs were being rearranged without him having any control over the situation.

Painfully and terrifyingly known to him, his boxers were being pulled up and down by different tentacles too, and at some point the animal must have realized that if it pulls both sides together downward the material comes off.

_"God, just kill me now!"_

That's how Zoro found himself feeling his modesty cloth sliding down and off him eventually. He wasn't sure if he wanted Usopp to help him at this point anymore. How could he live down the embarrassment?! No one, absolutely NO ONE had ever seen his green bushy private hair! He wished he had shaved it at least! Not that it could help him much at this point. He was held upside down, his arms tightly fixed above him, slightly bent and away from each other. His waist was bent backward and his legs, now bent at the knees were pulled as apart as humanly possible.

Zoro felt his consciousness beginning to fade in and out, as he was now completely out of air, but a new surge of panic brought him back to full awareness.

One tentacle has just slide between his ass cheeks and was now fingering around his ass hole!

_"Oh for fucking shits sake!"_

The other tentacle that used to be on his leg had now reached up and circled fully around his cock, and began tightening and sucking around his member. An uncontrollable gasp escaped Zoro as the tentacle forced itself into his ass from behind.

Big mistake.

Not only he got a mouthful of water into his lungs, the tentacle around his face took that as a chance to slide into his mouth as well.

Zoro's eyes went wide, and he felt his eyes burning, tears coming out. He gasped again as the tentacle pushed deeper into his ass, involuntarily sucking the limb in his mouth further down.

The beast must have sensed his reaction, and have probably liked it too, because it continued the pattern pushing inside, back out a few inches and pushing fully inside again.

Zoro wasn't sure if his spasms were from his lungs giving out, or from the gasps resulted from frequent and strong thrusts of the thick tentacle deep into his back. He felt his cock harden and the octopus sucking harder around it, while lightly touching around his balls.

The limb in his mouth was pushing with the same rhythm too, and Zoro's fading senses narrowed to the feeling of pleasure and desperation and humiliation and disgust, until his muscles tensed way more than he ever remembered in life, and he arched painfully backward and with a load deep growl in the back of his throat, after what felt like an eternity of climax, he came.

The descent from the climax didn't slow down, and he went lower and lower into tagging numbness, and finally he felt himself go completely limp and his already limited consciousness faded into nothingness.

--------------------

Usopp has never been more terrified in his life. He cursed himself over and over again as he ran up to the deck. They shouldn't have fished that big monstrous thing. He thought back to the troubles they went through to get that thing up and throw it into the aquarium. Stupid, stupid, stupid. Now what was he supposed to do? What if Zoro's already eaten? What if he drowned down there?! What should he tell others?

Usopp stopped at the trap door and looked down. Damn he couldn't see anything from here. He noticed the discarded dial and picked it up. He had to think quickly. This big beast was dangerous, and Zoro didn't even have his swords with him. Damn it! Usopp looked around. "Think" He told himself, aloud. He knew that fire could frighten animals but that wouldn't work under the water! He had heard that to kill an octopus you should stab it in the head, but this thing's head was twice as tall as Usopp's whole body. How could he find a large enough sward, get it down there and stab the thing? No, Usopp wasn't a swordsman under the water. Above, he could take ten thousand men, or maybe not, damn who was he kidding?! But down there, no way! He had to save Zoro and he couldn't afford to die in the process.

Time was flying fast. Who knew how much longer Zoro could hold on? Suddenly Usopp had an idea. He brought his hand up, and looked at the impact dial. Yes! All he needed to do was to take Zoro and that beast out of water and if the octopus was still alive, he could kill it by his best fire shot. A plan already formed in his mind he ran back down to the gallery, but he stopped short and gasped when he saw the state Zoro was in.

He was held upside down, bent backward, legs wide open, head tilted backward, and Usopp was horrified to see a tentacle in his mouth, and two others down around his now naked privates. What in the world was going on?!

Suddenly Zoro arched backward, and after what felt like an eternity went limp with his eyes falling close. This brought Usopp back to action with a jolt. Eyes narrowed with rage Usopp ran to the window and stuck the impact dial to the glass. He didn't care as the crew found the gallery broken and flooded. All he cared about at the moment was to take Zoro away from the beast. He clicked the dial and counted backward. _Three, two, one,-_

"BOOOOMMMMMMMMM"

The explosion sent him flying back and slammed him into the far wall of the room. Water and broken glass fragments followed and Usopp kept his hands in front of his face to protect himself. After a few minutes, the water finally went down, and Usopp cringed thinking about all the rooms in this floor that were now flooded with smelly aquarium water. But he had something else to worry about.

Looking around, the teenager spotted the black octopus in the middle of the gallery, with Zoro still limply held in its moving clutches above the ground. Usopp's rage flared inside, and he took out the worst fire blast he had, and aimed it to the still moving beast's head, as away from Zoro as possible. All his rage and protectiveness surged into him and he shot the bomb straight at the animal's head.

The small explosion bloomed into a burning fire on the back of octopus's head, and yellow liquid started oozing from all suckers on the beast's tentacles, and with a creepy writhing on the floor the thing finally stopped moving, all his tentacles falling down one after another, over each other.

Zoro fell down too, limbs sprawled carelessly around, still wrapped in the octopus' tentacles.

Usopp ran over to him and sat on his knees. Without taking in anything else, Usopp first took the slimy tentacle that was in Zoro's mouth out. He suppressed a gag when he saw how deep that thing had gone into Zoro's throat. The yellowish liquid that the octopus had oozed trailed from inside Zoro's mouth over his slack lips and chin.

Usopp looked over.

Zoro was still.

Too still to be good.

Too still to be breathing!

"Oi, Hey Zoro! Don't do this to me! Come on!!"

Zoro didn't stir.

_"Shit!"_

Usopp hurriedly removed the tentacles from around Zoro's neck, then the one that was around his chest and waist. He then took off the two lifeless tentacles that were keeping Zoro's equally lifeless arms above his head. Having freed his nakama's upper body, Usopp lowered his ears to Zoro's chest. To his immense relief he could still hear a heartbeat.

Not wasting another second, he closed Zoro's nose, tilted his head backward, and put his lips on the man's, breathing in, out, in, out, in, out, ...

Suddenly he felt a spasm through Zoro's body and with tears of joy in his eyes he turned his patient sideways to prevent him from choking.

A terrible cough rocked Zoro's body and water came out in waves from the man's mouth and nose. After what felt like a decade, a painful one, Zoro's coughs finally ceased and he just lay there on his side, panting hard and fast, with his eyes closed.

"Zoro-kun, are you hurt anywhere? I'm gonna help you up now.." Usopp said while gently easing his nakama to his back again.

Zoro's eyes opened a crack, still panting with his face strained and flushed, and he whispered hoarsely, "'M fine..." and with an extremely shaky hand tried to whip the trails of yellowish octopus trail from his mouth. Even this small movement seemed to exhaust him completely though, because he lowered his hand down beside his head, and simply laid there staring at the ceiling with unfocused eyes.

Usopp ignored Zoro's comment completely and went to remove the last two black tentacles around the swordsman's lower body, but then his face went deep red when he realized one of the beast tentacles was still deep inside Zoro's ass!

"Uhm.."

Now this was an awkward situation. Usopp wished the heat on his face could go down a little at least. He was worried about the liquid that the octopus had oozed before its death. It was definitely a defense mechanism, and from the tingling of his own lips from when he had given Zoro a mouth to mouth, he knew that the liquid must have been some paralyzing effect.

He knew he shouldn't let the tentacle remain inside Zoro for long. From what he had learned, octopus poison wasn't life threatening and only made the victim numb, long enough for the tentacles to _Usopp shuddered_ crush the bones of the victim and sallow it. But this beast was too big even by the great Captain Usopp's standards, and who know how much poison it was pouring into Zoro, and by the look of it the green-haired man wouldn't recover fast enough to save himself either.

Biting his lips he tried again.

"Uhm.. Zoro-kun,"

Zoro's eyes turned to look at him again,

" ... there's something I have to take out of your.. Uhm...". Usopp's face turned a new shade of red, and he noticed that Zoro's cheeks were as flushed as his too.

"Usopp.. huh..I can't.. huh.. move..." Zoro was still panting, and Usopp was sure the tentacle up his ass wasn't helping calm down him either.

"I think that's the octopus' poison affecting you. Don't worry, it's only making you numb, but we shouldn't wait anymore. I'm gonna pull it out now", and with that he grabbed the heavy tentacle between the swordsman's legs, and pulled.

"AAAaaaarrrgggghnnnn"

Zoro arched his back, closing his eyes tightly, his cheeks and now his neck getting deep red.

Usopp tried his best to ignore his friend's reaction, and done with one tentacle, gently unwrapped the other one from around Zoro's …cock. He was NOT noticing the swordsman's curly light green hair over that tanned skin of those perfectly tuned muscles, and definitely NOT the hard dick sticking out. He swallowed in his suddenly very wet mouth, and took his eyes away from the unnatural sight. He was NOT thinking of his nakama in this way!

Zoro's panting finally slowed down and Usopp got a glass of water, and pushing the man up, brought it to his lips.

"Here Zoro-kun. This is water. Drink slowly..."

Zoro looked at him with burning eyes, face still deeply flushed as if in embarrassment. He looked away for a second before nodding his head and allowing Usopp to help him drink.

"…Thanks"

With eyes still looking away, Zoro slowly and weakly moved his hands back, trying to lean on them and staying upright on his own.

Usopp gently lessened his support and was pleased to see Zoro gaining enough strength back to sit without falling over.

He took a moment to look at the man he looked up to. Slumped forward, eyes half open, as if staying awake was an ordeal already, naked, water glittering on his body, Zoro couldn't look any more... vulnerable. Seeing his hero shivering and breathing strained clenched at the younger boy's heart. Speaking of shivering...

"Hey Zoro" Usopp spoke gently, "I'm gonna go get some blankets and I'll be right back. Do you think you can be okay?"

"Yeah..." Zoro's hoarse whisper sounded very tired.

Usopp ran over to his room, his own bed, and grabbed the blanket. Zoro would probably like a shower and some nice rest, and that's what he the great Captain Usopp would make sure Zoro would get! The gallery needed a cleaning too, and Usopp would better find a nice little story to tell others because he sure as hell couldn't bring himself to tell anyone about what happened to Zoro. Well, at least he was good at this part!

Zoro was flat on his back again as Usopp returned to the gallery, and seemed to have fallen asleep. Okay so maybe the shower could wait after all.

Usopp knelt beside the man and covered him with the blanket. He looked around and spotted the swordsman's wet underwear somewhere near the broken window, but a quick look at the shivering green-haired man told him he's better find him a clean and dry one at least. He ran out on the deck and got the discarded clothes and grabbed a dry pair of boxers from men's closet on his way back too. He ran back with a heavy heart, as the last thing he wanted right now was for Zoro to become more uncomfortable having to be dressed up.

But fortunately, turned out that he didn't need to worry about this part at least, because the swordsman was too deeply asleep _probably unconscious_ to wake up when Usopp shook him gently at first and more firmly again.

"Zoro, hey Zoro! Come on, wake up!"

But the man just kept breathing slowly and didn't respond to his call. At least this time he was breathing while being unconscious, so things were looking up!

Dressing a passed out man wasn't as simple as it looked. At the end Usopp had to sit the swordsman between his legs, leaning the man's back over to his chest to be in position to pull the boxers, pants, the shirt and the green haramaki on the man. All the while, Zoro's head was hanging low, chin touching chest, and his limbs hanging lifeless like those of a puppet. Usopp kept talking to him in the silent room, more for his own sake than anything, because he knew Zoro would probably be out cold for a while...

"..and then I freed the princess, but they wanted to give me some reward. You know, my crew at the time was about three hundred men and feeding them was really expensive, and my advisor told me to ask for food. Well we have been fighting for 4 days and we needed to rest there anyway. In four days that we were there they killed fifty thousand fishes to feed us. Imagine that! The princess offered to be my fiancé too but my heart belongs to my beautiful Kaya so ..."

Having Zoro in his lap, slowly moving the man around, listening to his constant deep breath, Usopp felt more and more secure and, unknown to him, his stories were becoming less and less from an unreal world...

"...then my right hand man, _a swordsman just like you_ stood up against the big shichibukai, no fear even when his wounds were bleeding, and slashed the guy in half. He helped me up then, because I had gotten those fifty bullets for him... "

Usopp kept talking, and in the meantime put back the now fully dressed swordsman down and moved over on kneel on top of him, heaving him up to his chest. Hugging Zoro chest to chest, Usopp half dragged half carried the green-haired man into his room and laid him gently down on the sofa. Adding a blanket and Usopp was satisfied with the outcome. Zoro would be fine now! Time to do something about the wet, smelly gallery...

Oh well!

------------

After hours of hard work, the ship was finally back to normal. As normal as it could get anyway. Dead fish was thrown out, wet ground had dried off, the smell was nearly completely blown away, and only the empty frame of the gallery indicated anything has happened at all. Oh and the heavy corpse of the black octopus in the middle of the gallery, since it was too heavy for Usopp to throw it out. But everything was fine, because the sniper had a convincing story about it...

Franky, Brook, Chopper and Sanji were the first group to show up.

"Usopp! Marimo! Take your lazy asses down here and help us load this stuff."

Usopp ran out of the ship and over to the carriage full of groceries and drinks, meat and rice, taking two handful. "Hey what's up guys?" He greeted the group.

"Damn marimo! Must be asleep somewhere again. Useless musclehead.." Sanji grumbled walking up beside Usopp.

"Hey Usopp! Look at my hat!" Chopper was bouncing up and down beside them, with a cute pink octopus hat on his head.

"Aaaaa!! Cute Chopper!! Where did you get that?!" Usopp couldn't resist. The hat was way too cute.

"Aaaah!! This doesn't make me happy idiot!! Hehehe, Brook bought it for me!! Hehehe"

"I couldn't help it. My heart flattered when I saw those hats. But then again I don't have a heart!! Yohohoho!!" Brook joined them from behind taking his share of items to loads to the ship.

"Shut it skeleton-bro.. You were hoping to see that shopkeeper's panties, you perverted old man." Franky called from next to the carriage.

"Ah, so true! So true, yohohoho!"

"Oi shit-head, where the hell have you thrown your shitty corpse? Get the hell down here and help for once!" Sanji shouted again, and Usopp did his best to pretend not to know anything.

According to his story, Zoro had been training, then had gone to nap, and the black octopus had then broken the gallery window and Usopp had had to clean the room by himself. Dinner wouldn't be ready until a few hours and by then Usopp hoped Zoro would get enough rest to act normally again. As long as Zoro was fine, no one needed to know what had happened. He left the bags at the deck and went over to help bring more stuff up…

"SHIT! GOD DAMN IT, USOPP WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED TO MY GOD DAMNED KITCHEN?!!!" Sanji's shout wasn't totally unexpected after all.

"Oi long nose bro, what does Sanji mean? Stay here with the carriage.." Franky ran up the ship. Usopp waited for a few seconds...

"YOU SNEAK, WHAT DID YOU TO MY SWEET SUNNY? HOW DID YOU EVEN BREAK THE GLASS?!!" Well, that was expected from Franky too.

"AAAAAHHHH SANJI! THERE'S A BIG OCTOPUS THERE! IT'S GONNA EAT MEEEEE! ZOROOO!!! SAVE MEEE!!" Chopper's voice joined the chaos…

"AH MY HEART! WHAT A SCARY SCENE IN FRONT OF MY EYES!! BUT I DON'T HAVE EYES OR HEART!! YOHOHOHO!"..

And Usopp was really happy he was alone near the carriage!

A few hours afterward, the crew had gathered, the convincing story was told, and the Sunny was off to get to the next big island and another adventure. Everyone, except a certain first mate was on and about again like before, and no one was questioning about the missing swordsman. Napping was his virtue after all.

Usopp had checked on Zoro again and again, every half an hour, until he had finally seen him laying there staring at the ceiling with two heavy-lidded but clearly open eyes.

"Oh hey, Zoro! You're up!" Usopp greeted the man enthusiastically.

Zoro glared at him, his cheeks reddening ever so slightly.

"How're you feeling?"

"Better..." And it was true. Zoro's voice was mostly back to normal, only slightly hoarse which probably wouldn't be noticeable by the crew at all.

"Good! Look, I've managed to let them believe that the octopus broke the glass, and you were training at first and then napping when it all happened. As long as I know, nothing else has happened. Is that fine with you?"

Zoro was looking at him with wide eyes, and then he blinked, his face getting a darker shade of red, and looked down.

"Che, of course..."

And Usopp was happy to see the swordsman's eyes softening and his lips curling into a small smile. He watched as Zoro gingerly put his legs down and stood up, walking stiffly to the door..

"...I'm gonna take a shower..."

On his way out Zoro paused beside Usopp and the younger boy was surprised when he felt a strong hand on his shoulder gripping firmly and a murmured _"thanks"_, but a moment later the hand was gone and Usopp stood alone in the room and unable to stop the grin from his face.

Everything and everyone, and especially Zoro was back to normal.

And for the first time, it was him, the great Captain Usopp who had become the hero of the story.

~fin~

A/N: I KNOW it's not the best you've ever read but please be kind and review! :"P


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